Meet Microsofts other artificial intelligence

Chris Burns

If you live in China, you may already know about Microsofts "other" artificial intelligence. Cortana lives in the United States and is spreading across the world - but were not talking about Cortana. Were talking about XiaoIce - aka "Little Ice."

Microsoft China is working on a service called XiaoIce. This service is already ready to roll in Beta form for several apps and is being integrated with a few more in the very near future. Its pretty awesome - you speak with it, and it speaks back to you - like a text-only version of Cortana, but ready to dive deep into a wide variety of apps.

But whats it doing in China? And why isnt it here in the United States?

XiaoIce works with Sina Weibo, its going to work with WhatsApp, it works with text chat. So whats the deal?

Just this past month, Microsoft announced that itd be bringing Cortana to China with Windows Phone 8.1 - its nickname was (and is) "Xiao Na." XiaoIce is a sort of derivative of that. Heres what it can do in a basic chat - translated from Mandarin:

Jerry: XiaoIce, will it rain tomorrow?

XiaoIce: Tomorrow the weather in Beijing will be nice with a maximum high of 25*C. No rain to get you soaked.

Jerry: How about the day after tomorrow?

XiaoIce: The day after tomorrow, the weather in Beijing will also be fair, with a max high of 23*C.

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Meet Microsofts other artificial intelligence

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